Throwback Thursday #5Ayn Rand on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson (1967)

Love her or hate her, Ayn Rand has certainly given the world something to think about. Though she has many hecklers (some of whom understand something of her perspective, and many who don’t understand a lick of it), and even many libertarians who would fundamentally disagree with her on several important issues (myself included), one can’t help but admire much of what she had to offer, especially in light of her origins and how that colored the entire spectrum of her life right up until the end. Her attempts at philosophy may have been amateurish, but one can’t help but admire the determination to attempt to use the power of reason to free oneself from the shackles of human un-reason and the morass of conventional thought. I still remember the first time encountering her through The Anthem my sophomore year of high school, and the powerful effect it had on my imagination regarding the sanctity of individual identity, and the pernicious threat of collectivism.

This interview features her first appearance on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson who, all-in-all, was pretty fair and even-handed, perhaps moreso than even I, and especially many other libertarians, might have been! (Of course, this was before she became enshrined in historical myth and followed by fairly dogmatic schools of thought.)

Anyway, this is a pretty satisfying glimpse into the libertarian past. Enjoy!

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A Christian market anarchist with an associate's degree in web design. Specializes in writing about theology and philosophy. He is one of Altar & Throne's co-founders and co-admins. He has an avid interest in economics and seeks to incorporate cultural parallels to libertarian insights. Currently exploring Girard's mimetic theory of desire and violence, and how that relates to the underlying structure of the state. A fan of theologians as diverse as David Bentley Hart, N.T. Wright, Michael Heiser, and Thomas Talbott. Site admin for New Apologetics, and one of the hosts of the Youtube show The Wondering Pilgrims.

4 comments

Justin: I just heard about the website through the Tom Woods podcast. I love what I’m seeing on the site. I could see myself submitting articles. And I know others that might. But I see no details on how to do so. Nor do I see a “master plan.” 🙂 Would you please email me and I’ll provide contact info and other details so we can talk?

Hey Caleb, thanks for your comment.
As for becoming an author, this actually spurred some thinking between the authors of this site on how we might respond to such requests. All of us actually got to know each other and their writing styles from this facebook group I started a few years ago: https://www.facebook.com/groups/christianancap

A process for writers who would like to apply for authorship here might eventually be hammered out, but for now, feel free to request membership to the group (assuming you’re a Facebook user), and let us get to know you a bit first. If not, then perhaps we can come to some other arrangements.

Hey Caleb, just to echo what Justin said, the Christian AnCap group is where we all met. We hope you’ll join – we’re super excited to get mentioned from Tom Woods, and we’d love to meet more Christian Libertarian folks to talk with. Even if you don’t end up writing for the blog, the Christian AnCap group features a lot of writing, debate and discussion. One of the reasons we decided to blog in the first place was that so many of us were writing lengthy essays in the Facebook group. So there’s plenty of opportunity in that group to get your writing noticed and shared.

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